Maria Elisabeth Winblad II (1895-1987)/Interview transcript
Maria Elizabeth Winblad II (1895-1987) audio interview from August 1986 by Susan Penny Van Deusen (1952) at the Lutheran Home in Jersey City, New Jersey. Transcript *Penny: We thought of some questions to ask you. *Penny: Like what year were you born in? *Maria: 1895. *April: 1895! *Maria: inaudible *Penny: We brought a tape recorder, so we can listen when we get home. *Maria: Well, I would say I wish you all now to have a nice day, and a nice year in your home there and enjoy yourself where you can run all around in the grass with all your friends. Yes, that's nice. *Penny: Christy wanted to know what your parents were like. *Maria: What they were like? Well, I will show you. Did I have the bible here? gets her bible, she may have shown a photo from inside her bible *April: Hi, I am April. *Time: 1:50 *Penny: They wanted to know what was your mother's name and what was your father's name? *Maria: My mother's name was Salmine, S - A - L - M - I - N - E. "sell-meena" You see that is where Selma gets her name from.Selma is Selma Louise Freudenberg (1921-2009). My mother did not like Salmine ... That is a nice name, why didn't you call her Salmine? S - A - L - M - I - N - E. That's the name you saw, see? You remembered ... Salmina, and my father's name was John, that is another John, only his was John Edward. John Edward, that was my father’s name. That's another John. *Time 2:34 *Penny: How many children did they have? *Maria: I think my mother had seven, but she raised three. Well Eddie was one. We went up the street there one morning, my mother told me I could take him out, and a little girl had whooping cough and she had everybody in the yard, you know, I didn't know she had whopping cough. I guess I was eleven sic, was I eleven? We went up there and they had things to drink and all. Both Eddie and I came down with whooping cough. The doctor said the little girl there was no hope for. My brother the little fellow went into pneumonia and he died. The doctor said he had no hope for the little girl. *Penny: How old was he? *Maria: I was 4 and I think he was 2, 2 years old. We just walked up the street and they had whooping cough there. They never should have let all these children there, they had lemonade. There was no hope for the little girl. ... Eddie went into pneumonia and he died ... Like my mother said ... piece of bread ... Not Eddie ... He was such a good little fellow. Daddy has the papers, that is where I will be buried.John Edward Winblad II (1897-1899), aka Eddie Winblad, died on September 24, 1899 and he was 2 years old. Maria was 4 when he died. *Penny: Is that in New Jersey? *Maria: New York Bay Cemetery ... Daddy had paid so that I have that grave there.Maria Winblad Freudenberg was indeed later buried at New York Bay Cemetery next to her brother when she died in 1987. *Penny: Were all of you born in the United States? *Maria: Yes. My grandparents were both Christian. My mother was only 2 years old when her mother died ... How old is your little one?John Linson, Penny's youngest child. *Penny: 14 months *Maria: ... baker ... he never remarried and raised these seven children, and my mother was only 2 years old when her mother died, and he never remarried. He was a very religious man. He lived it. *Penny: What did he do for a living? *Maria: He was a baker *Maria: He was the dean of a college there.Anton Julius Winblad I (1828-1901), her Swedish grandfather was the primary-school teacher, not a dean of a college. Anton's daughter, Frideborg, would become the principal of the elementary school and the stories have become conflated and exaggerated. *Penny: What was your last name before you were married? *Maria: Winblad, W - I - N - B - L - A - D *Christy: Where were you born? *Maria: New York City ... I was 9 months old when my father had the house built. Jersey City ... Apple trees and a dirt road across the street and a big pasture there. IN the winter ... They had a carriage, a two-seater, it had the fringe around it laughs, ... I would like to have a ride in one of them. He had a big pasture across the street ... one block to the other ... *Penny: Who was the oldest child and who was the youngest? *Maria: Uncle Otto was the youngest, he was the youngest. I guess maybe there were some younger than him, I think Otto was the youngest ... He had several die when they were babies, little babies. I don't think they lived too long. *Penny: Who was the oldest? *Maria: Tony, Tony was the oldest, he lived to be 88. Otto was 75, I think 75. Uncle Tony was 88 when he died. *Penny: Why did your parents come here? *Maria: Well ... I guess my father ... well, naturally he was on the boat, he must have been over here several times ... when he was away on the boat ... on the ship in the beginning ... when he met my mother, then he wanted her to go up to Sweden ... she went up there and stayed, I don't know how long, with his father and mother... They had a cleaning lady and a lady that did the cooking. *Penny: I would like to have two ladies help at home. *Maria: He was gone for 5 years, he ran away from college.John Winblad was on 15 when he ran away so he was still in the equivalent of high school. ... He would have come to it himself. I remember Selma ... Selma said I can't sleep ... this is when she started high school... try it for one month ... and I will talk to your teacher. Try it for a month. Selma. When she got the report ... I am not going to make the mistake that my father did. ... She was happy. ... He was gone 5 years and he was in Norway and must have liked her. He said he wanted her to go up to Sweden to meet his father and mother before they were married. I don't think his father was alive.His father was alive and he died in 1901.... I think the father had died. He was gone for 5 years . He had four sisters and two of them were nurses, and his father wanted him to be a pastor. If my grandfather had not been so strict, he may have been a pastor. With Selma ... and she did and she got a good report. *Penny: So they came to the United States right after they were married? They didn't have children in Norway? *Maria: ... Brides where my mother was ... smells terrible ... She washed the chicken off and put it in the oven. You can't take that back, clean it. You can't take that back ... Your supposed to take that out. That was one of the newlyweds. There were brides in her house. *Penny:Do you remember going to school here? *Penny: They didn't know anyone here? *Maria: *Penny: How old were you when you started school? *Maria: Number 11 school ... firehouse. *Penny: Do you remember any friends from school? *Maria: I remember the day I graduated. *Penny: Did you go all the way to 12th grade? *Maria: volume lowers as microphone goes too far from the speaker ... My father paid $10 a month. *Penny: You had to finish the course? *Maria: That bothered me ... *Penny: What did you do after you finished your business course? *Maria: ... Cuba ... *Penny: What did he try to do? *Maria: ... He would tell them where to put the ... They were in the ship in the bottom ... *Penny: Why couldn't he stay in Cuba? *Maria: He was a man of the sea, he couldn't make a penny there. ... He had a house built ... It had four rooms ... four bedrooms. *Penny: How old were you? *Maria: I was 15 ... Otto and I were there a year and a half. Tony married Eva ... There was this woman, she lived across from us, ... one day a storm came up and she came running over to Eva and the house blew down the road. My father told my brother when you have that house built, I want it to have a good foundation. ... They didn't build houses like that, they just put up something else. ... *Penny: Your brother took care of having it built? *Maria: He was there, no .... He didn't pay for it, my father paid to have the house built. *Penny: He supervised? *Maria: He supervised. *Penny: That was Otto? was Anton who stayed there *Maria: No, Otto was home with my mother, and him and I went down. See, my mother and father, we all went down. My father didn't make a go of it and he came back. Then my mother got sick down there with her heart trouble and that and she went back. Then my father wrote and told me that my mother needed me. I then I came up 17, I took over. *Penny: Here? *Maria: On Booraem Avenue. I did the washing and the ironing and the shopping for my mother, you know. * Time: 22:00 *Penny: *Maria: * Time: 22:54 *Penny: Do you remember any of your little friends from school? *Maria: No, I do not remember any of them. I do remember the day that I graduated, I felt kind of sick. I had a sick, lonesome feeling. ... that was the day we graduated. * Time: 23:00 *Penny: Did you go all the way to 12th grade? *Maria: I graduated from City public school number 11. *Penny: * Time: 30:00 *Penny: And Otto lived with you? Did Tony and Eva live there too, you all lived together? *Maria: Up in the Bronx? No, this was Reservoir Avenue ... Booraem Avenue, with four rooms. moved to the Bronx when he returned after 1915. So I took care of that. *Penny: Why did they go to Norway? *Maria: My father wanted to go there ... her father's house. Otto ...My mother stayed at the inn there. *Penny: How long were they gone over there in Norway? *Maria: They died over there. *Penny: They both went together and they took Otto? *Maria: My aunt's house, that is where they stayed ... *Penny: How old were they? ends Notes Transferred to a digital format by Kevin Borland in 2009. Transcribed by Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) starting in 2010. Last updated on July 9, 2015. Updated on October 15, 2019. Category: Audio transcripts Category: Maria Elisabeth Winblad II (1895-1987)